Pity For The Trapped Man

Once upon a time, a man was trapped in a mandatory training seminar.

The presenter - who, in fairness, looked nothing at all like a sadistic fiend who delighted in slow misery - had begun his presentation by stressing the importance and significance of every facet of the 261 page report. He explained that the 261 page report was a major improvement over the previous report, which (including indices, addenda, and supplements) had run to several thick three-ring binders. These three-ring binders the presenter picked up from a table and held up for all to see, thus communicating the absolute truth of what he said.

The new version of the report (the 261 page version) was, therefore, a dramatically condensed and simplified version. It was, the audience was informed, a tremendous improvement over the older version of the report compiled by the presenter's predecessor. Every section, subsection and sub-subsection had been carefully and painstakingly revised, rewritten, and updated. Every section, subsection, and sub-subsection was, therefore, worthy of the closest scrutiny.

However, the presenter assured his audience, he did not intend to take up any more of their valuable time than was absolutely necessary. He would summarize the report as briefly as possible while still providing the relevant information so critical to everyone's daily tasks. After this assurance, he began to read from his slides.

The trapped man fought to stay awake. Slide after slide came and went with the slow, inexorable force of a glacier on the march. Each slide was a dense, bullet-pointed cliff face to be scaled, a craggy obstacle course heavily spiked with UTLAs and MFLAs (Undefined Three Letter Acronyms and Mysterious Four Letter Acronyms, respectively). Each slide held at least twelve bullet points. Each bullet point was between nine and fifteen words long, and each was explained by the presenter with a paragraph of dense legalese, read directly from the important, significant, condensed and simplified 261 page report. The trapped man concluded (correctly) that to the presenter, every word of every paragraph of every section, subsection and sub-subsection was a precious jewel, a beautiful child of his own creation.

In-depth explanations were read out on the roles, responsibilities, oversight, management, deputizations and chains-of-command of people the trapped man did not know, for jobs the trapped man had no interaction with, and for corporate locations the trapped man would never see.

White text on a blue background made the trapped man think of the light-gathering cellular structures of the human eye, and about how the human eye (relatively insensitive to blue light) worked with the human brain to interpret blue light as a cue for nighttime. The trapped man could feel the effects of the artificial twilight on the screen, how it mixed with the droning monotone of the presenter's voice in the overheated room. The sound was like the rustling of poplar trees, moving to and fro in a summer breeze. It was the sound of a slow stream sped to falling foam as it rushed on rocky rapids...

The trapped man walked along the riverbank, balancing carefully on the mossy stones, dim and indistinct in the fading light. The footing was tricky so close to the water and the trapped man considered each step before taking it. Mist rose from the water, obscuring the stars overhead, just starting to emerge in the purpling sky. The lulling sounds of the trees and the water were hypnotic at the water's edge. Tiny silver fish rose from the water to feed on the insects that buzzed and hummed and swarmed over the surface of the stream. With little flashes of reflected starlight, the fish rose up, showed themselves, and were gone again. His eyes on the silvery fishes dancing under the dark blue water, swimming in the dimness of the soft summer night, the trapped man slipped on the stones and fell forward into the stream.

When the trapped man fell out of his chair with a half-snore, half-cry, the presenter stopped, mid-paragraph. The general laughter of the room was silenced by a scowl of disapproval from the presenter. There followed a ten minute digression from his prepared slides, the presenter's intention of said extemporaneous digression was to once again stress to the captive audience the importance and significance of the 261 page report. The presenter was sorry that some people might consider the material to be a bit dry, but he assured the audience that the training was being conducted for a reason, and that everyone - and (he clarified) by "everyone", he meant "every single person in this room" - had responsibilities which had to be carried out in accordance with the standards laid out in this report.

The presenter stated, however, that he did not wish to take up any more time with such distractions. He trusted that everyone would recognize the need for the fullest possible attention to this important material. His digression complete, the presenter began again with the paragraph which explained and expanded on bullet 5 of slide 22.

And once again, a man was trapped in a mandatory training seminar.

===== Feel free to comment on this or any other post.